Bitcoin Strength Continues on U.S, China Easing; Floki Bot Crosses Trading Milestone

• BTC is up 1% as it trades near $64K during the Asia business day.
• Polymarket traders are giving a 50% chance that the Fed makes another 50 bps cut.

Bitcoin BTC$102,955.38 showed signs of strength Wednesday as it retook the $64,000 level in early Asian hours, but later retreated, to reverse drawdowns from a day before, with alternative token Sui SUI$3.90 leading gains in the broader market.

BTC added 1% in the past 24 hours, data from CoinDesk Indices shows, while Solana’s SOL$162.79 jumped 3% to lead gains among major tokens. Ether ETH$2,213.29 was flat on the day amid signs of a fallout with institutional investors, while BNB Chain’s BNB$627.24 showed signs of reversals after a 10% rally in the past seven days.

The broad-based CoinDesk 20 (CD20) index, a measure of the price performance of the largest tokens by market capitalization, was up 2.4%.

Outside of majors, memecoins and layer-1 token bets have led gains in the crypto market on continual demand and positive sentiment among traders. Sui Network’s SUI$3.90 jumped 16% in the past 24 hours to extend weekly gains to nearly 50%, while dog-themed memecoins jumped over 5% on average.

Floki’s FLOKI tokens zoomed 16% over the past week as its speedy and cheap trading bot crossed $75 million in volumes and crossed $1 million in net fees - with part of that amount now put aside to buy and burn FLOKI from the open market.

Developers also said late Tuesday that Floki’s metaverse game Valhalla had signed a multi-year partnership with esports organization Alliance to boost users and visibility ahead of its release in November.

Looking Ahead

Bitcoin traders have received a boost in the past week as countries from the U.S. to China are easing monetary policy to combat a slowdown in thier economies - setting the bedrock for what can be a rush to riskier bets in the coming months.

Expectations that the U.S. Federal Reserve will cut its benchmark interest rate by another 50 basis points at its November meeting is currently at 50% on Polymarket, while the possibility of a 25 bps cut is at 44%.

Some traders say the Fed’s move ultimately influences other authorities to take similar steps, leading to a snowball effect.

“The timing of the announcement suggests that the Fed’s policy played a key role in the PBoC’s decision,” Presto Research analysts said in a Wednesday note shared with CoinDesk. “There’s been chatter that what’s holding the PBoC back from being more aggressive in providing monetary stimulus is the risk of it losing efficacy due to capital flight, as CNY’s short-term rate has been below that of the USD since mid-2022.”

“It’s becoming clear that the Fed has finally started its rate cut cycle, removing such concerns. This implies that we may see more from the PBoC as the Fed continues to cut rates and the negative rate differential narrows,” they added.